When Long Beach murder case falls apart, authorities trade blame while victim’s mother is left in the dark

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Christina Davis’ son, 23-year-old Brian Humphries, was shot to death in Long Beach in 2010. Authorities arrested a man they thought was responsible but had to let him go last year on the eve of trial. Police and the prosecutor then pointed fingers at each other over who was to blame.
Long Beach, March 20, 2018. Photo by Brittany Murray, Press Telegram/SCNG

Christina Davis’ hands still shake when she talks about the night her son was killed.

On Sept. 10, 2010, he had asked her to stop by his Central Long Beach apartment after she finished up her shift at work.

Davis arrived just as a police car pulled up. Her son, 23-year-old Brian Humphries, was bleeding in the street.

“After I got off of work and I drove up, he had already been shot,” Davis said. “He was lying there on the ground.”

Today, more than seven years later, Humphries’ family continues to struggle not just with grief but from a lack of answers about why the accused killer was released on the eve of trial a year after his arrest. Police say they’re still investigating, but a frustrated Davis said she has been told little by authorities.

Meanwhile, behind the scenes, conflict raged with law enforcement officials sparring among themselves over who was responsible for possibly botching the murder case that featured the misspelling of a key witness’s name, an allegation by a witness of being steered to the suspect, and police struggling to explain a years-long delay in the investigation.

When the mistakes spilled into court last year, it offered a rare glimpse into the normally hidden process of how prosecutors weigh the credibility of police officers accused of missteps.

The case’s emotional toll has been especially hard on one of Humphries’ brothers who was with him moments before the killing, Davis said. He had walked around the corner as the shots rang out, seeing nothing. Now, Davis says, he’s extremely withdrawn.

“I’m losing two sons because of this, and it’s like nobody is being held accountable for it,” Davis said. “No answers, no nothing — I get nothing.”

•••

The case against Humphries’ accused killer fell apart last year, on May 15.

That’s when 25-year-old Daniel Delatorre was at the Governor George Deukmejian Courthouse in downtown Long Beach where his murder trial was about to begin. He was the only person who had been arrested in the case.

According to court records, prosecutors planned to have three people testify that they had seen at least two men jump out of an SUV that had been circling the neighborhood and ambushed Humphries outside an apartment near Lewis Avenue and 10th Street.

One witness told police he heard gunfire and turned around to see Delatorre shooting Humphries, a detective testified.

Prosecutors said Delatorre was part of a tagging crew that often fed members into one of Long Beach’s largest gangs. At one court date, a police officer suggested this particular gang sometimes shot black men such as Humphries, who was not in a gang, simply to stoke racial hostility and cultivate fear.

Christina Davis’ son, 23-year-old Brian Humphries, was shot to death in Long Beach in 2010. Authorities arrested a man they thought was responsible but had to let him go last year on the eve of trial. Police and the prosecutor then pointed fingers at each other over who was to blame.
Long Beach, March 20, 2018. Photo by Brittany Murray, Press Telegram/SCNG

Christina Davis’ son, 23-year-old Brian Humphries, was shot to death in Long Beach in 2010. Authorities arrested a man they thought was responsible but had to let him go last year on the eve of trial. Police and the prosecutor then pointed fingers at each other over who was to blame.
Long Beach, March 20, 2018. Photo by Brittany Murray, Press Telegram/SCNG

Delatorre denied any involvement, even after detectives confronted him with a fake letter saying the Department of Justice found his DNA at the crime scene (a tactic that was legal, attorneys not connected to this case said).

Delatorre’s public defender, Alison Hudak, told the judge that detectives first homed in on Delatorre in March 2011 when a man in custody on suspicion of an unrelated robbery told them Delatorre was responsible for the killing.

But when Delatorre’s previous attorney asked in 2016 to see police reports about the robbery and any details on the man’s criminal history, she said, prosecutors said none existed.

That changed only days before trial was to start last May, when prosecutors emailed Hudak detailed accounts of the robbery and revealed that the suspect, who was now a key witness in the Delatorre case, had been convicted in 2012 of possession of drugs for sale, according to court transcripts.

“More importantly, these reports list that the witness’s name is not Juan Valdez,” Hudak told the judge just before the jury was to be picked. “It is Juan Valadez, with an A between the L and the D.”

Further, Hudak said, just that morning her courtroom opponent, Deputy District Attorney Angie Christides, told her that one of the other two witnesses was now alleging that the detective pointed out who to identify as the shooter.

Christides filled in the judge with details.

The witness said this happened while a detective was showing her a typical photo lineup, a half-dozen pictures displayed at one time, that officers call “a six-pack.”

“One of the detectives pointed to the photo — of Mr. Delatorre — and said, ‘I see you looking at this picture,’” the prosecutor explained, recounting what the witness told her. “‘Why are you looking at this picture? Is this the person you believe did the shooting?’ (The witness) said, ‘Yeah, it kind of looks like him,’ And the detective said, ‘Well, you’re right. That’s — that’s the shooter.’”

Police dispute this account, saying witnesses in gang shootings often find excuses to recant their testimony out of fear.
Armed with new information, Delatorre’s lawyer went on the offensive.

“This is absolutely outrageous government conduct,” Hudak said, according to the court transcript. “This is the worst I’ve ever seen. … We have a witness who, until just this weekend, I didn’t even know his correct name. We have reports that I was never given for a snitch who was in custody on a robbery when he pointed to my guy.”

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“And I think, quite frankly, that the prosecution, unfortunately, has been the victim as well of their own detectives,” Meyer said at one point.

One of the witness’s IDs was clearly tainted, she said. And the misspelled name that concealed Valadez’s drug conviction?

“I might have thought that this was just a typo at one point in time, except it just — there’s too much coincidentally going on,” Meyer said.

Meyer told the prosecutor she wouldn’t be allowed to call Valadez or the other tainted witness to the stand, essentially neutering the case down to just one person claiming to have seen anything.

After a short court break, Christides announced she was dropping the case, at least for now.

In the audience, Delatorre’s supporters broke into celebration.

•••

Shortly after dropping the case, Christides, the prosecutor, wrote a memo to her supervisors. She said that the detectives, Todd Johnson and Malcolm Evans, were involved in a series of either blunders or intentional omissions during the investigation, according to police.

She wrote that they belong on a secretive list the District Attorney’s Office keeps of officers who have committed misconduct or made mistakes serious enough that defense attorneys need to be informed before trial.

Prosecutors commonly keep such lists because they’re legally obligated to reveal any information that could point to a defendant’s innocence, including past behavior that could be used to challenge a police officer or other witness’s credibility.

Police argued Christides’ allegations were overblown. Ultimately, prosecutors decided Evans and Johnson did not belong on the list, according to the union that represents Long Beach’s officers.

But police do admit a series of blunders harmed their investigation.

“We’re talking about a perfect storm,” Long Beach Deputy Chief Richard Conant said. “A comedy of errors that could only happen with something like this — this important for us.”

The Long Beach Police Department declined to make available the detectives for comment, but in a lengthy interview with the Press-Telegram, police officials said mistakes started shortly after Valadez was arrested on March 27, 2011 for allegedly being part of a group that punched someone and took a hat. While in custody, he said he knew something about a murder, which earned him an interview with Evans and Johnson.

During that interview, the detectives never asked Valadez how to spell his name, police said, assuming it was Valdez.

“Throughout the entire murder investigation, my detectives had the name wrong,” said Sgt. Robert Woods, a supervisor in the department’s homicide unit.

The detectives even joked that Valadez shared a name with Juan Valdez, the fictional character that often appeared with his donkey in a long-running ad campaign for Colombian coffee, according to two sources familiar with the case. Evans and Johnson did make an attempt to double-check the spelling, according to police: They ran the erroneous name and Valadez’s date of birth through the department’s internal records system.

It came back with a match — but that record of Valadez, from some previous, unrelated interview with gang detectives, also had his last name misspelled Valdez, police officials said.

Police were also incensed by an implication in Christides’ memo that detectives tried to protect Valadez in exchange for his testimony. The robbery case against him was never officially closed or passed along to prosecutors to consider filing charges.

Instead, it had been transferred from a gang detective to Evans, after he and his partner interviewed Valadez. Evans never knew he’d been given that robbery case, so it was no longer pursued, police officials said.

Police have since fixed the loophole that let this case be reassigned without any notification, said Woods, the homicide supervisor.

What’s less clear is why the misspelling of Valadez’s name wasn’t discovered by detectives and prosecutors until days before the trial was scheduled to begin. Police laid blame for that on Christides.

“Think about this,” said Conant, the deputy chief. “Defense attorney or prosecution, what’s the first thing you want to do with your client (and any witness)? You want to know his history, his background. You don’t wait until the last day. Whether prosecution or defense, that’s not a last-day thing.”

But police admit there were delays in the case before it ever made it to the courtroom.

Valadez pointed police toward Delatorre in March 2011, but it wasn’t until almost five years later, in January 2016, that detectives followed up with other witnesses and asked them if they recognized Delatorre, according to court records.

Police couldn’t point to an overarching reason why this happened.

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“If there’s a gap in there, there’s a gap in there,” Conant said. “No excuse for the time period other than these guys are busy and they’re working, and so if it falls off the plate for whatever reason, and other cases are in there, then that’s just an unfortunate piece until they can circle back to it and get going again.”

Conant said there are many things that can slow down a homicide case, and he emphasized that both detectives assigned to Humphries’ death were busy. Police said they were involved in 71 other cases during that time.

The Long Beach Police Department blames Christides for the failed case, contending she did not fully understand it and then tried to compensate by pointing the finger at detectives.

“This is a district attorney that is basically throwing accusations at the homicide detectives,” Woods said.

They complained that Christides did not push back harder against the defense attorney’s allegations of unethical behavior or give detectives a chance to explain in court as the case was falling apart.

The detectives involved in the case have since filed a complaint with the State Bar of California about Christides. The Police Department lodged a complaint with the District Attorney’s Office, an agency it usually works with in concert.

Christides and the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office declined comment for this story. They also declined to turn over the memo she wrote to her supervisors, even after the Press-Telegram filed a California Public Records Act request to view it.

•••

Davis had gone to court often, following the case. But she had to work that day the man accused of killing her son was set to free.

Later, she went online to check for the next court date. When she saw there wasn’t one listed, she called Evans.

After hearing Delatorre had been released, Davis told the detective she’d have to call back later.

“I was just lost for words,” she said. “I was literally devastated.”

When she did call back, she said she wasn’t told much. Evans did say that police were working hard on the case, she said.

This week, Davis said authorities still haven’t explained to her why the case was dropped.

“I want closure for my son. No, it’s not going to bring my son back, but I want closure,” she said. “It’s sad to say that you have to be wealthy or into politics for somebody to do anything.”

Jeremiah Dobruck is the public safety and breaking news reporter at the Long Beach Press-Telegram. He's a SoCal native who has covered crime, courts and mayhem at news outlets in Los Angeles, Orange County and New York City since 2011.

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